Stone masons of Lesvos. Social networks, techniques and local history (1850-1950)

Stone masons of Lesvos. Social networks, techniques and local history (1850-1950)

Christos N. Chatzilias
Athens 2020, 256 p., 217 ill., 5 maps, 15 graphs.
ISBN 978-960-244-212-8
€ 42,00

 

The book Stone masons of Lesvos. Social networks, techniques and local history (1850-1950), by Christos N. Chatzilias, linguist and social scientist, Phd. at the University of the Aegean, has come to enrich the Foundation's contribution to the literature in the area of traditional techniques and material culture. This work focuses on the networks of the stone masons on Lesvos and their buildings (public buildings and private residences), highlighting local micro-history as well as the larger economic, social and cultural context of the eastern Aegean area.
Christos N. Chatzilias completed this work after many years of archival research and study of sources in bibliography, in combination with on-site research about the stone buildings on Lesvos island. In addition, the author drew upon the oral testimonies of old stone masons and on information from the interview they gave him, and he depicted vividly the wide network of processes and the "course" of the stone as primary material, the formation of family workshops, the mobility of stone masons on the island and elsewhere, the list of representative works, the social and economic parameters of stone masonry. The case studies analyzed are the villages Skalochori and Anemotia in the northwest of the island, which were the birthplace of famous families of stone masons. The wealth of photographs accompanying the research work depicts the structured environment and the architectural characteristics of Lesvos, the features of the cultural heritage of this land and its inhabitants.